Libya Live Blog - April 8

Libya Live Blog - April 8

As the uprising in Libya continues, we update you with the latest developments from our correspondents, news agencies and citizens across the globe. Al Jazeera is not responsible for content derived from external sites.

• Timestamp: 

  12:21pm

  Coast guards have said that a boat laden with 171 people fleeing Libya have arrived in Malta. They are expected to undergo health checks before being taken to an immigrant centre on the island. More than 1,000 refugees have arrived in Malta in the past few days, and some 150 have been lost at sea in an attempt to reach the island.

• Timestamp: 

  11:27am

  Reuters quotes rebels as saying they are fighting Gaddafi forces trying to enter the city of Misurata from the east.

• Timestamp: 

  10:39am

  This video posted online by Wefaq Media is said to show the air strike that killed at least four people outside Brega yesterday.

• Timestamp: 

  10:21am

  NATO's deputy commander of Libya operations describes the alliance's strategy in Libya as coherent and says the alliance continues to target "those who harm civilians".

  Regarding the two air strikes outside Brega which appear to have killed four opposition fighters, he says that before yesterday, the alliance had no information that the opposition was using tanks. He says the situation on the ground was "very fluid" and that he is "not apologising" for the strikes.

• Timestamp: 

  10:14am

  NATO air strikes outside Brega yesterday "may have resulted in the death" of opposition fighters but the circumstances remains unclear, Russell Harding, deputy commander of NATO's Libya operations, says in a press briefing in Naples.

• Timestamp: 

  7:47am

  Our correspondent Sue Turton reports from Tobruk, on the rebels' need of better weapons and claims that they are receiving arms from abroad.

   

• Timestamp: 

  6:19am

  Al Jazeera's Laurence Lee, in Benghazi, says reports are emerging that it might not have been NATO that hit a rebel armoured unit outside Brega. He says it might instead have been a light plane used by Gaddafi forces, suggesting that they are getting arms from outside.

• Timestamp: 

  5:07am

  The UK Telegraph newspaper says two British businessmen with no connection to the protests against Gaddafi's regime have been imprisoned in Libya for three weeks, just two of many who have reportedly disappeared since mass protests began in February.

  The opposition Transitional National Council says more than 20,000 people have been rounded up, while Amnesty International has been able to confirm 30 disappearances.

• Timestamp: 

  4:47am

  The UK military's action in Libya has prompted Prime Minister David Cameron to rethink Britain's defence budget, Sky News reports.

  "Changes could include U-turns on plans to cut the number of RAF Tornados and scrap surveillance planes," the report says.

• Timestamp: 

  3:03am

  Scottish police have interviewed Moussa Koussa, the former Libyan foreign minister who fled the country in March, regarding the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, the UK Guardian reports.

• Timestamp: 

  2:18am

  On Thursday, Abdel Fattah Younes, the defected head of the rebel military, confirmed for the first time that the opposition forces have received foreign weapons: anti-tank guns from Qatar. The tiny but wealthy Gulf country has been at the forefront of support for Libya's anti-Gaddafi movement, offering them official recognition and to be a broker for their oil.    

• Timestamp: 

  12:05am

  Welcome to Al Jazeera's Libya live blog for April 8. You can catch our continuing coverage and the latest developments on yesterday's live blog as well as our news stories.